Kanye West: New Slaves

Due to the fact that of late, modern mainstream music has been of little or no interest me I must admit that I have found myself having to wade through heaps the more 'celeb-centric' blogs and various other miscellaneous news feeds in order to soak up some of the media hype surrounding this new release. The common consensus is that Mr West's latest single from his new album 'Yeezus' can be summarised as part truth, part rant and part attention seeking.

The video for the controversially titled. 'New slaves' was previewed last week via a broadcast on the walls of 66 buildings across the world in a sort of Banksy esq guerilla art exhibition.The song - that begins with the line "My momma was raised in the era when, clean water was only served to the fairer skin" focuses aggressively on the issue of modern racism in America and how those in power conspire to re-enslave black people by way of unlawful contracts, misleading messages and the propagation of the pursuit of (mostly unattainable) material wealth.

As a self confessed conflicted artist (see all falls down - college dropout).Kanye himself would probably plead guilty to some of the accusations that he has put to the overlording, powerful corporate industry. He has certainly revelled in his own success but then again it would be hard not to; especially with all of the thrills and spills that modern celebrity can bring and of course, having women like Amber Rose and Kim Kardashian falling all over you.

That said, Kanye has always maintained a conscious streak throughout his career (perhaps more so in the early days) and he is no stranger to radical outbursts, just ask Taylor Swift or even George Bush.

I for one am all for a bit of artistic radicalism and Kanye West being an industry insider is probably in a perfect position to do it. I suppose attacking the industry from the inside maybe is all that is left for Kanye to do after everything that he has achieved in his tumultuous career. I can't help but think that there is an air of Samson pushing against the stone pillars and bringing down the building of his oppressors all around him about this whole event. Perhaps, it's just wishful thinking, I wonder what else 'Yeezus' has install.

David, TCC